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Sunday, July 29, 2012

Precious Moments

Tonight I watched a spider spin its web. Predetermined precision, line after line. Watching the spider spinning, I marveled at the mystery of how the spider knows what to do.

Around and around the spider goes -- looking like some tiny machine. Every evening taking nearly an hour to construct the new web.

I couldn't draw a web as well as the spider spins it. A programmer might be able to program a bot to spin a web, but under every condition? A scientist may be able to clone one, but could she write its genetic code?

Earlier Mother was telling Son about the loon migration. Every fall the parents fly south first leaving their young to figure it out on their own. Aren't you glad you aren't a loon?

What calls the juvenile loon south? How do monarch butterflies manage to make the long flight to Mexico? Even when I learned migratory creatures have some type of built in compass, that doesn't explain it to me satisfactorily.

It's easy to be wrapped up in my to do list and miss the life that is going on around me. Swimming past along the bottom of the lake, an invertebrate. Slowly eating its way through the sand in a long, snaking path, a clam. Spiraling past in a mating dance, two dragonflies.

It is easy to forget that all life is connected. We all came from the same source, and are here only a small fraction of time. A bat snacking on insects along the lake shore. The spider spinning its web. Me talking to my mother and brother.

Each day I lean into the experiences of my life as fully as I can, to feel it all. Joy and sadness. Hurt and comfort. Anger and laughter. And unlike the spider, I have choices in how I live my life, every precious moment.